


tales from a sunny bullworth summer

by orphan_account



Category: Bully (Video Games)
Genre: Multi, Summer AU, Teenagers, highschool
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-14
Updated: 2019-04-14
Packaged: 2020-01-13 03:44:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18460781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Bullworth's summers are always nothing short of horribly languorous and stagnant. The free warmth of the sun and gently bracing breeze do nothing to carry away the collective feeling of boredom. But this summer is different. This summer, there's possibility.(OR: wholesome good summer times in Bullworth.)





	1. he sees bullworth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jimmy decides to paint the town in all its pretty summer splendour.

Sure, Bullworth is a dump of a town. The place is overflowing with an unorthodox amount of drunks and subtle, petty criminals that nobody ever seems to notice. Every kid is uniquely messed up beyond measure in their own strange way. There's always curious problems brewing and bubbling beneath everyone's exterior. Hell, even the animals act like they have some serious issues, with their constant yapping and yelping at nothing but empty air and passing wind.

But - hey - at least it looks nice in the summer!

Jimmy can't deny how pretty the town suddenly becomes as the dreary spring skies bleed their last drops of seasonal tears. For what feels like the first time in years, the throbbing sun appears to shine from amongst a clear, cloudless sky. It's as brilliantly blue as the Aegan on a hot day and has an unchecked warmth to match, bathing the town in a heat they haven't experienced for what feels like a lifetime. A blindingly bright, yellowish light that induces intense eye-squinting and exasperated head-turning seems to permanently tint the natural scenery. The newly blossomed trees radiate such an ethereal glow from beneath the gleam that Jimmy finds himself craving the idea of painting them.

 

So he does.

 

After his classes have finished for the week, on a pleasant Friday evening, Jimmy rides his bike out with his sketchbook and oil paints. The usual noises that accompany Bullworth no matter the time of year (lazy traffic and stagnant, plain conversation and the mischievous giggles of young kids) worm their way into the picture that begins to bloom on the paper: thick and thin smears in the surroundings of the trees that, to anyone else, would be nothing but drops of colour. But Jimmy sees them for what they are as he listens to their melody swirl around him.

 

He sees Bullworth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> updates are coming soon! any comments are appreciated :)


	2. hope and something else new

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vance and Lucky discuss their plans for the summer and some unexpected news is shared.

"Goin' anywhere nice for summer break?" Lucky inquires, although he ( _thinks he_ ) knows the answer already.

 

It's most likely no. _It's definitely no_. It always is. For himself and Vance - and for all their friends - it's no every time. Their parents can scarcely juggle the expenses of rent, food and heat with the fruitless minimum wage, bottom-of-the-ladder jobs they work so tirelessly to keep and get nothing much in return for. They'd never have the funds for a vacation, let alone the spare five seconds to consider one. And as much as Lucky hates those rich, preppy scum with every bone ( _good and bad; kind and mean_ ) in his body, there's no use in covering up his envy; he'd love to snap his fingers each day and suddenly end up in a new country and a bottomless bank account to splurge with there.  


 

He takes the cloth from Vance's dirtied hands and dabs at the beads of sweat that begin to trickle like minuscule rivers across his forehead. He's just about in time to catch the way Vance's eyes seem to change. It's a quick flicker that Lucky knows nobody else would ever be able to catch: from hardened, firm and concentrated; from colourless, narrowed and precise. It's a flicker of hope; it's a hasty dance of light in his eyes that curves alongside the swift quirk of his lips. They tuck their heads back under the cars they're working on and it's gone as rapidly as it appeared.

 

"For once, actually--" he mutters, voice slightly muffled by the cacophony of metal against metal in the workshop--"I think I might be!"

 

Lucky's eyebrows instinctively raise and a grin easily finds it's way to his features, although he knows Vance can't see him. Only the sound of metal resonates around the garage as silence eclipses the pair. It's a comfortable type of silence while they bask in the familiarity of the dripping grease of the cars and the hottness of the fractions of sun that manage to peek in from behind closed doors and narrow openings. Vance has no trouble finding reason in the quiet to continue.

 

He smiles as he begins to speak, although he knows Lucky can't see him.

 

"Ma' bagged us some tickets to Italy. Can ya' believe it? It's amazin'! An' I've never left this dump either, so it's my first vacation too, I guess!"

 

Finally wrapping up the work on his car, Lucky emerges, only to find Vance has already finished. A small, hopeful smile sits atop his lips as he stares up at the ceiling, hands tucked under his head. He seems miles away, lost in the euphoric jungle of his daydreams.

 

"Maybe things are really changing for us this summer, eh?" Lucky offers.

 

Vance laughs, turning to face his friend, "I hope so."

 

Tenuous threads of light filter in through a slight gap in the door as they finish up, packing away tools and throwing around casual banter. The atomosphere is breezy; everything is familiar. Yet something weighty is still suspended in the air around them: transparent and intangible but there nonetheless. It isn't suffocating or tense and it doesn't coil and constrict around them like something more sinister may be inclined to do. It rests comfortably, blending into the gentle equilibrium with ease. As they leave the workshop and the sun begins to settle on the horizon, retreating leisurely into its bed for the night, the curious sensation releases into the air and is picked up by the wind. It draws the breath from Lucky in the same tenderly coercive way the sparkle in Vance's eyes had.

 

It's hope. This summer is going to bring hope.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey!!! updates on this are probably going to be a little sporadic because - while i do like this idea - i only really work on it when i have the inspo or when i feel like it. anyway, constructive criticism is appreciated :)


	3. midnight rendezvous

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Christy and Angie spend time together at cheerleading camp when the only things that can hear their whispered promises are crickets and the moon.

Midnight glimmers ahead; the cheerleading camp is submurged in pure darkness and the sound of cicadas humming their contented tune is the only noise for miles. Stars stretch above, scattered haphazardly, blinking and winking. The grass is damp with dew and something more - residual rainwater from a flash of a downpour earlier that day. The scent: a salty breeze carried straight from the water mingled with the odour of _outside_ \- it's summer and it's easy to tell.

 

Christy looks down at the water, feels its freezing grasp nipping at her feet. It's like death, perhaps; the night in its cool splendour, stained with Stygian and silence and all wet and cold. She takes in a sharp, bitter breath and her eyes roam the lake. The moonlight has left a trail running through it. She can just make out her refracted reflection in the bright ripples, standing out against shimmering black. She looks rough: her eyes are sunken into paper-white skin, her once fiery red hair appears brown in the lack of light, her lips are pulled taut into a frown. She is quite the mess beside Angie, whose eyes are bright and playful, mantled by new specs, whose jet black hair sits perfectly against her shoulders, whose lips are bearing a grin just for her - just for _her Christy,_ who has no choice but to smile right back at the sight of the two of them mirrored in the water, curled up against one another.

 

The wet moisture of the grass between Christy's fingers is cut off as she feels Angie slide her hand over the ground, interlocking their fingers. Christy pulls their joined hands together and seals it with a light, feathery kiss. Angie's hand is warm and soft, while Christy's skin is dripping and frozen to the touch, and it's balanced by a slight touch of lips.

 

"I could stay here forever," Angie mumbles into Christy's shoulder, voice full of longing and something more, something Christy cannot yet place.

 

"But then someone would see us," Christy whispers.

 

She knows Angie realises that, she knows she understands the risks. But something within her compels her to stop her fantasy, not for Angie but for herself. The two of them aren't even a confirmed thing. Or at least Christy doesn't think so. Sometimes when she needs someone to hold onto that doesn't smell like unhealthy amounts of sweat, someone to tell her they love her who doesn't say that to a million other girls per day, someone kind and warm and wise, they do _this_ \- whatever _this_ is. And then Christy will find another boy to entertain her and Angie will go back to asking Jimmy and Ricky and whoever else for flowers and nothing will have changed but it still won't be the same.

 

At times like these, when they meet up, it's always night. The only people awake at such ungodly hours are the drunks and druggies, or the people who are using the cover of midnight to do things deemed just as illicit as what Angie and Christy engage in. Those people couldn't care less about two girls frolicking around as long as it doesn't interfere with their own nasty habits. For some reason, the night seems to change them. Angie always talks of leaving school and finding solace in someplace accepting, like New York (and she never fails to mention that it's totally not because of those Sex and the City binges they go on, too). There they can be whoever they want to be, whether that is completely themselves or new identities hidden in their hearts, and they can do it together.

 

"I know, but it's nice." Her expression is distant and her voice is tender and light, almost as if it's about to float away. "I like being here with you."

 

Christy never says it, never even expresses it in a hum or a loving squeeze of her hand or a tiny smile, but she likes being with Angie too. It's easy to like being with Angie like this when she forgets about her worries and the pressure of her future and the judgemental eyes of the rest of the world. It's easy to like being with Angie like this when she forgets she's not supposed to like it at all.

 

The first time whatever they had began to truly blossom was at the very cheerleading camp they lounged in now. A game of truth or dare between the two of them and Mandy resulted in a surprised kiss that left her mouth stinging with the taste of apple-flavoured chapstick for at least a week, despite her having used a hazardous amount of mouthwash in a vain attempt to clean it out. Fourteen-year-old Christy (though she) knew that girls liked boys and boys liked girls and girls couldn't like girls because boys couldn't like boys. But when they kissed once more in front of the lake and Christy tasted that sweet apple-flavoured chapstick on her tongue, she realised that perhaps some things weren't so set in stone - _some things she had to discover herself_.

 

"Me too," Christy said, words trapped beneath weighty silence giving way to a smile on Angie's pink face that Christy could just make out through the wobbling ripples of the lake. "Me too."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> clandestine cheerleading camp rendezvous???? yes pls. lmk what u think! :)


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